"How about this." After roughly five minutes, Hoshina finally spoke, her voice a cool night breeze through wire and glass. "Go back, while your days are still calm. Go back... don't get tangled in this storm."
Xiao Qianxue stared at Hoshina in disbelief, eyes like startled deer in moonlight. Hoshina added, her tone losing its earlier lilt, an electronic weight humming like rain on neon. "I said, go back. Right now you're just an ordinary person. Knowing this much is enough for you."
"But..." Chaos rolled through the blonde girl's mind like waves against a cold pier. She had been dragged here like a leaf on a river. She had asked for nothing, just receiving whatever Hoshina beamed over like radio snow. Yet something snagged her heart, a knot that wouldn’t loosen. It was refusal, a spark that wouldn’t go out. Power—yes, power. Without it, she was ash on the wind. How could she save her parents? How could she share Lin Fan’s burden, even a little? And why did his face rise again like a lantern in fog...
Off to the side, Bloo offered no comment. His head stayed bowed, gaze sunk in the rippling tea, like a pond swallowing the sky.
"Isn't there anything that can help me? Something to give me strength, something to let me challenge them." Little Loli’s confusion cleared like mist at sunrise, leaving a single sunlit target. She refused to watch herself fall before her enemies again, a flower crushed under boot.
"Mm?" Hoshina’s eyes flashed with an infrared glow, a red thread through the dark, then it vanished like a firefly winking out. "So you’re serious. What, did seeing Bloo’s power trigger that chuunibyou itch—the edgy hero phase?"
"..."
"Relax, I’m teasing." Her voice turned bright again, a bell in a courtyard, as she drifted circles around Xiao Qianxue. "You mean your old abilities are all sealed, and you can’t use them, right?"
"Yes." Excitement bubbled up first, then heat flushed her pale cheeks like dawn. A few gold strands clung to her forehead with sweat. These two could trade blows with the Ouyang Clan and walk away whole; if she could learn anything here, it would be a star in a dark sky.
"Well... it’s not hopeless." Hoshina floated toward Bloo, smile like a crescent blade. "Bloo, do you still have those injectors you carried before?"
"Yeah." At her voice on the table, Bloo raised his head to the virtual girl, sunglasses hiding whatever weather lay in his eyes. Even the blonde wondered what kind of storm he kept behind that glass.
"Then please grab them, okay?"
"Tch. What a hassle..." Bloo stood. His form shredded like shadow in wind and slipped away. In barely a second, multiple afterimages stitched back together, and he was in the same spot again. To a normal person, it would have been a brief blur. The two green vials in his hand proved his steps were real.
"So fast..." Little Loli breathed, her small mouth parting like a cherry blossom in spring, cuteness spilling like sugar.
"Two bottles left. Guess you didn’t leave much behind that day." Hoshina teased as Bloo set the vials on the table, then sat and went quiet, tea steaming like a small cloud.
"What are these? Do I drink them and turn into Superman?" Xiao Qianxue eyed the vials from a distance, a child at a candy stall.
"Not Superman—but they help, and not a little." Hoshina pulled up an ops screen and an info panel, light blooming like water. Her fingers flew over a keyboard, crisp as rain on bamboo. "There, done." She flicked the info screen toward Little Loli; a laptop-sized panel blossomed before the blonde like a lotus.
"These are the effects and functions of the two injections. Read first, then decide whether to use them." Hoshina perched on Bloo’s tea table, perfect legs crossed like ivory branches, though they were only light and code.
"Smile for me, Bloo. I haven’t seen you smile in ages." Hoshina pouted, lips like a cherry. Bloo kept drinking, silent, as if a breeze blew through an empty room.
"Only this much..." After reading, the blonde flopped onto the sofa, a fallen kite, disappointment drizzling down.
"This isn’t enough?" Hoshina vanished from the table and popped up beside Xiao Qianxue, a sparrow hopping to the rail.
"Compared to my real ability, this is weak, like paper." Little Loli muttered, pointing at the hovering screen. It promised a full-body boost, big gains in aiming and shooting, and an unknown side effect—what kind of joke was that?
"Save the bravado. As you are now, you’re a very normal girl." Hoshina’s tone cooled like stone under shade. "I scanned your body. If we force you into something very strong, the road ahead is a dead end." She snatched the floating panel, crushed it into light, and tossed it aside like a moth.
"And let me be clear. The one you fought to the bitter end last time was the organization’s tenth-ranked esper. Even with both vials, you still won’t be that strong. But against ordinary members of the organization, you’ll be more than enough."
"Ha, number ten?" Relief slipped out of the blonde like air from a tight chest. She’d thought the caped man was a small fry. Turns out he was already top ten.
"So, be content."
"Then what rank would Bloo be in that organization?" Curiosity flickered like a cat’s tail; Little Loli had to ask.
"Him? He can thrash that so-called Eleventh Hand." Hoshina tilted her chin, pride bright as morning.
"One finger’s enough." Bloo dropped the line like a pebble into a still pool.
"Ugh..." She remembered how she’d been crushed then, a clay doll under a boot. Yet the one she couldn’t touch could be beaten by a single finger. The gap felt like a cliff in fog.
"That’s it. Head back for now. Call this number tomorrow morning. I’ll have Bloo come pick you up." Hoshina floated to Little Loli, voice gentle as night rain. "You’re safe for the moment. Later? Who knows. Be ready."
"Mm. It’s late. If I don’t go home, my brother will worry." The blonde nodded, agreement soft as a sigh. A flicker of displeasure crossed Bloo’s face, a cloud passing the sun, then went away.
"Off you go." Watching the two vanish into the elevator like swallows into dusk, Hoshina turned to the vials on the table. A brief sympathy glimmered in her eyes, a candle in wind, then went out.
"Having a girl this young use these... it really is cruel."
